As of March 31 this year, the federal government was owed $18 billion in overdue tax accounts, compared with just $9.6 billion in 1997. Put another way, about 5.5 per cent of all the money owed in federal taxes as of March 31 this year is overdue, compared with about 4.3 per cent in 1997. About $8 billion of the outstanding taxes are owed by individuals; the rest are due from companies.
It's particularly noteworthy that the total number of dollars left unpaid by corporations exceeds the amount unpaid by individuals. Meanwhile, according to the Finance Department, total revenue from personal income tax was over three times that from corporate tax, by a margin of $84.9 billion to $27.4 billion.
I'll grant that there's an apples-to-oranges element in comparing accumulated debts to annual incomes. That said, it still bears mention that the ratio of personal taxes paid to unpaid is over 10:1, while that for corporations is under 3:1.
Can we agree to take corporate tax cuts off the table until corporations start matching individual Canadians in paying the taxes that they already owe?
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